Getting ready for X’Mas with wine and cookies

Chennai

GINGER BREAD HOUSE

INGREDIENTS

• All-purpose flour: 710 gms 
• Baking powder: 7 gms  
• Baking soda: 3 gms 
• Salt: 1gm 
• Ground ginger: 20 gms 
• Ground cinnamon: 8 gms 
• Ground cloves: 1 gms 
• Unsalted butter: 88 gms 
• Dark brown sugar: 177 gms  
• Egg: 1 large 
• Molasses: 130 ml 
• Vanilla: 9 ml 
• Finely grated lemon zest:  4 lemons

METHOD 

• In a small bowl, whisk together flour, baking powder, baking soda, salt, ginger, cinnamon and cloves until well blended. 
• In a large bowl (KitchenAid’s great for this) beat butter, brown sugar, and egg on medium speed until well-blended. 
• Add molasses, vanilla, and lemon zest and continue to mix until well-blended. 
• Gradually stir in the dry ingredients until blended and smooth. 
• Divide dough into half and wrap each half in plastic and let it stand at room temperature for at least two hours or up to eight hours. 
• Preheat oven to 375 degree Celsius. Prepare baking sheets by lining with parchment paper.
• Grease or line the cookie sheets with some parchment paper. 
• Place one portion of the dough on a lightly floured surface. Sprinkle flour over dough and the rolling pin. 
• Roll dough to a 1/4 inch thickness. Use additional flour to avoid sticking. Cut out cookies with desired cutter — the ginger bread man is our favorite of course. 
• Space cookies 1 and a 1/2 inches apart. Bake one sheet at a time for 7-10 minutes (the lower time will give you softer cookies — very good). 
• Remove cookie sheet from oven and allow the cookies to stand until the cookies are firm enough to move to a wire rack. 
• Serve them to guest with or without warming as desired.

Recipe:  Chef Dinesh Pai, Pastry Chef, Park Hyatt Chennai

RICH CHOCO-WALNUT STAR COOKIE

INGREDIENTS  

• Butter: 140 gms 
• Brown sugar: 80 gms 
• Egg: 1 
• Maple syrup: 12 ml 
• Flour: 190 gms 
• Baking soda: 4 gms 
• Chocochip: 250 gms 
• Walnut, chopped: 120 gms 
• Honey: 12 ml 
• Orange rind: 1 no 
• Vanilla essence: 2 drops

METHOD:

• Beat butter, sugar, honey, maple syrup, orange rind together until it is fluffy. 
• Add the egg and beat again.  
• Throw in all the dry ingredients, fold it into the batter and whisk till there are no lumps 
• Sheet the dough to about 5 mm thickness and cut with a star -cutter, place in baking tray with butter paper. 
• Bake them at 180 degree Celsius for about 15 mins.

Recipe: Chef Raja Mohan at The Residency Towers

HOMEMADE FRUIT WINE

Having been born and brought up in Fort Cochin, I have imbibed quite a bit of British and Portugese culture pertaining to the area.  There is no home in Cochin without homemade wine during the Christmas season.  It is a custom among the Anglo-Indians and the Catholics to serve wine on wedding receptions. I have learnt the art of wine making from my mother-in-law, who used to make excellent wine every year for Christmas.  Any fruit mixed with sugar and yeast will produce so called “wine”.  We used to have wine made out of banana, pineapple, lime, beetroot, ginger, or grapes.  Grape wine has always been our family favourite. Here I share the recipe for the same:

INGREDIENTS 

• Black grapes: 1 kg 
• Sugar: ¾ -1 kg (depending on how one needs the sweetness, and depending on the sweetness of the batch of grapes) 
• Water: 1 litre 
• Yeast: 2 gms 
• Egg white: 1 
• Whole wheat grain: 2 tablespoons (Optional)

METHOD: 

• Cleaning of grapes is very important.  It has to be washed many times in water and if possible use potassium metabisulphite to kill any bacteria that can harm the wine.   
• Fermentation starts the moment the grape is crushed, as the grape contains healthy yeast enough to ferment it.  It is crushed with equal quantity of sugar and a bottle of water is added to the mix.   
• Yeast is added for extra fermentation and the whole wheat is optional.   
• The crushed wine is then stored in china jars and the mouth closed well with clean cloth so that no wild bacteria goes in.  
• The pulp is crushed every day for the next 10-14 days and then egg white is added along with cleaned egg shell for clarity.   
• This has to be done with utmost care as the yolk can spoil the wine if it goes into it accidentally. The remaining 20 days we keep for the wine to brew.   
• After it settles down, it is strained out using clean muslin cloth.  However, there are many new methods used world-over. Some people use caramel to give it the colour, but I do not add caramel.  I just stick to the natural colour.   
• Wine, that is to be kept for a long time, has to be preferably put into coloured bottles and stored at room temperature (not too high).

NOTE: Normally, perfect wine is moderately sweet, gives you the grape taste and a slight burn as it goes down your throat, making you feel slightly tipsy in a while. When we make our own wine, we maintain the quality of the ingredients and good hygiene, which is the most important factor for making good wine. The presence of wild yeast in the air can turn your wine into vinegar, if not properly monitored and kept at the optimum temperature. Before any one starts to make wine, an amateur person has to taste wine and know how it tastes like. Then only can he or she prepare it.

Recipe: Deepa Oommen

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